LulzSec disbands with parting hack

LulzSec has announced it has disbanded – but not without one last hack.

Its "planned 50 day cruise has expired," the group said on Twitter, "and we must now sail into the distance." A bit like that boring bit at the end of The Lord of the Rings, then.

In a parting shot, LulzSec claimed to have released the user names and passwords of over 750,000 accounts gathered from several gaming forums and the Battlefield Heroes beta. The leaked information is now online. It's probably worth changing your password. Again.

The Battlefield Heroes website is down as a result. "Service on the Battlefield Heroes free-to-play site has been temporarily halted while we investigate a security breach," EA said in a statement.

"Our investigation is ongoing however it appears that screen names and encrypted passwords associated with an early beta version of Heroes has been compromised. To the best of our knowledge, it appears that no personal data was compromised.

"No emails, account history, credit card numbers or payment methods. Any further updates will be posted on this page. We apologize for any inconvenience and hope to have the game back online shortly."

In a press release of sorts, LulzSec claimed it was made up of "a crew of six" and its 50 days of "lulz" had been planned from the beginning.

LulzSec has claimed responsibility for a number of attacks on video game companies. Its attack on Sony, it said, was motivated by the Japanese company's pursuit of PlayStation 3 jailbreaker George Hotz.

It went on to hack or attack companies and video games including Nintendo, Bethesda, Minecraft, League of Legends and Eve Online.